This International Pizza Hut Item Might Be Its Wildest Yet (And We’re Desperate To Try It)

Perhaps you remember when Pizza Hut decided to give the world a drinkable pizza. Don’t you? Well, we do. We remember it very, very well. Pizza Hut’s US menu feels positively tame compared to the items it sells internationally, and in May of this year, Japan decided to drop a curry-and-cheese-smothered pizza which was so liquidy that you could, if you wanted to (or potentially you didn’t have any choice), drink it instead of chewing it. It sounded wild, and not especially appetizing, if we’re being honest. 

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Cut to five months later, and we have yet another strange offering from Pizza Hut Japan. But this one? I’m…sort of into it. 

Pizza Hut Japan’s Malatang Pizza

This week, we learned via Dexerto that Pizza Hut Japan has just released a new pizza that takes inspiration from malatang, a Chinese dish that’s been described as a form of individual, faster hot pot, which is widely known for its numbing, spicy broth. How has Pizza Hut managed to turn this into a pizza, you ask? Well, instead of pizza sauce, it douses a pizza base in a sauce made with Sichuan peppercorns, five spice, and Sichuan and mala oils. Then, it adds mozzarella, Gouda cheese, and chewy Korean glass noodles. There are vegetable and seafood versions of the pizza, too, with asparagus, corn, squid, shrimp, pork, and wood ear mushrooms. 

Now, here’s the thing: This transformation of a pizza into a noodle dish (or a kind of meeting of the two) is, of course, pretty wild. But there’s something about this that really speaks to me. I think it’s the double carb vibe. I’m a big fan of glass noodles, in all their glorious chewiness, and while they run the risk of being too chewy with the cheese, I can see how this would work. And I’m always into fusion food. So…count me tentatively in. 

Noodles And Pizza: A Love Story

This isn’t the first time Pizza Hut Japan has waded into noodle-and-pizza territory. A couple of years ago, it brought out a ramen pizza, which tried to capture the vibe and flavors of the soup dish on a wheat base. It came with a separate sachet of sauce that you poured on before diving in. As with this new pizza, it was out there. As with this new pizza, it caused a lot of conversation. As with this new pizza, I’m kinda desperate to try it.